05 April 2021

Parallax View - part the fifty second

Another week's up, so here are today's numbers:
  >= 1,000 -   333
100 to 999 - 1,227
(New) grand total of counties reads at 3,081. While I've not gotten into an argument with the Topo folks over this re-definition of 'affected' counties, it certainly looks like a move to bolster wannaBePresident Huey Long 2024's perpetual lying.

[4 April] Stupid is as stupid does
For example, just 22% of those who say they'll never get vaccinated say they have avoided public places in the last week compared to 54% of those who are fully vaccinated, according to Gallup polling.
We're now I think in that cycle where the Upper Midwest is just now beginning to start this fourth surge. I think it was a wake-up call to everyone yesterday when Michigan reported out at 8,400 new cases, and we're now seeing increasing number of severe illnesses, ICU hospitalizations, in individuals who are between 30 and 50 years of age who have not been vaccinated.
-- Michael Osterholm

One hopes he is just being paranoid. But he's been right before.

Well yeah, I tole you so many missives ago
Doctors are worried that coronavirus may end up being like influenza, which requires a new vaccine every year both because the circulating strains mutate fast and because immunity from the vaccine wears off quickly.
Not, naturally, because I'm a scientist expert in coronaviruses. But, as the saying goes, I can read, and reading up on coronaviruses led rather swiftly to reporting that recovery immunity to coronaviruses has been short with previous types. Ergo, absent specific new evidence, we would be smarter to err on the side of caution with this type of coronavirus. There's been some complaining on various retail plunger investor sites of late that Pfizer and Moderna and J&J aren't/won't get rich off these vaccines. Well, I expect they will. I expect that, call it a booster or re-vaccination, we'll be seeing a two-fer (flu and Covid) shot next fall. And the fall after that... Time will tell.

What's still disquieting: no mention in reports about USofA Covid situation taking into account the P.1 variant overrunning Brazil. As with the NYC situation last year, it will take only one plane load from Rio to set in motion a new epidemic here. And, of course, it's already arrived.

[5 April] Welcome to the party, kids! Combine B.1.1.7, which is vectoring towards the Young Sets, and Ronny VirusSeed©'s Spring Break Infectiathon, and will we see another January spike? If so, will that be sufficient to disabuse the Younger Sets of their belief and assertion that Covid is The Old People's Grim Reaper, ergo of no concern to them? Sacrifice more than the occasional individual kiddie might be enough of a slap upside the head? Only The Shadow knows.
In Florida's Orange County, officials reported late last month a rise in Covid-19 cases in the 18-25 age group.

And a third of all of the county's Covid-19 hospitalizations were people younger than 45, according to Dr. Raul Pino, director of the Florida Department of Health in Orange County.

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